Blake Lively's claims against Justin Baldoni shine a spotlight on Hollywood's 'sinister' tactics

Actress Blake Lively may have been public enemy number one on the internet for a few weeks over the summer. Now she has filed an explosive lawsuit that she claims lifts the lid on the “sinister” tactics used to damage Hollywood's reputation – and has people questioning who and what to believe.

Blake Lively has always been a pretty harmless actress.

She has appeared in successful television shows and films such as Gossip Girl and The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants. She married another superstar Ryan Reynolds. She is friends with Taylor Swift.

Then in August, while promoting her latest film It Ends With Us, she suddenly became controversial, on the verge of being cancelled.

She was criticized for comments that appeared to downplay domestic violence, the film's subject; while embarrassing old interviews were recovered and repurposed as evidence of bullying behavior.

Public opinion—at least among those who knew and cared—seemed to have turned against her.

Then the movie came out, the furore died down and social media moved on.

But now Lively has filed a lawsuit alleging she was sexually harassed by “It Ends With Us” co-star and director Justin Baldoni — and that when she complained, he and his Wayfarer studio retaliated. having launched a campaign to “destroy” her reputation.

She was the subject of a “sophisticated, coordinated and well-funded revenge plan” designed to “silence her,” involving a “weaponized digital army” and false stories fed to “unwitting reporters,” her lawyers claim — and that's why she became the center of negative publicity.

Her lawyers have released text messages sent between Baldoni's publicist Jennifer Abel and Melissa Nathan, a crisis communications specialist hired by his studio to help deal with the harassment complaint. They appear to provide a rare glimpse into conversations that are usually kept out of the spotlight.

Nathan presented a strategy of “starting threads of theories” on social media, of “creating, uploading and promoting content that appears authentic” and engaging in “social manipulation,” according to the legal documents.

“You know we can bury anyone,” Nathan writes to Abel in one damning exchange.

Now the people hired to do crisis PR for Baldoni are doing crisis PR for themselves.

Abel said Lively's attorneys “picked” messages to include in their case without crucial context, and that “there was no 'putty'.

“No negative press was ever helped, nor was there a social plan to fight back, even though we were prepared for that, as it's our job to be ready for any scenario.

“But we didn't have to implement anything because the Internet did the work for us.”

The backlash against Lively came naturally and didn't need their help, Abel said.

Attorney Brian Friedman, representing Baldoni and his studio, as well as Abel and Nathan, echoed that.

He said Baldoni hired a crisis manager because of “numerous demands and threats” allegedly made by Lively, including “threatening not to (show up) on set, threatening not to promote the movie, which ultimately resulting in his death during launch if her requirements were not met'.

He said the plan drawn up by Nathan's firm “proved unnecessary as the public found Lively's actions, interviews and marketing on the promotional tour distasteful and reacted organically to what the media themselves picked up on”.

Overall, Friedman called Lively's complaint “disgraceful” and full of “categorically false allegations.”

In recent days, Lively has received support from a string of former co-stars and others in Hollywood.

The name of one of her supporters stands out.

Amber Heard, ex-wife of Johnny Depp, NBC said: “Social media is the absolute epitome of the classic saying, 'A lie goes halfway around the world before the truth comes out.'

“I saw this firsthand and up close. It's as terrifying as it is devastating.”

Heard was the target of hostility on social media during two high-profile defamation trials against Depp in the UK and US in 2020. and 2022 Nathan also reportedly worked for Dep.

Friedman responded to Heard by saying that the only connection between her and Lively was that “for decades, every move they've made has been there for all to see” so the public can “take their own your opinion – which they did, organically'.

Tortoise Media Head of Investigations Alexi Mostrous, who was hosting a podcast, called in Who is trolling Amber? earlier this year, looking at the abuse she received, said there were parallels.

“In both the Blake Lively case and the Amber Heard case, you see PR companies working with digital media specialists and other 'contractors' to promote online stories useful to their wealthy clients in ways that are opaque and misunderstood.” , he told BBC News.

“It's an unregulated world where all kinds of tactics can be done behind closed doors.

Variety said Lively's case “reveals a show business process designed to operate in the shadows — hiring expensive crisis communications experts to change minds and support clients.”

Her claims suggest a 'sinister shadow campaign' that has gone beyond what most advertising firms in Hollywood consider acceptable.” Sharon Waxman of The Wrap wrote.

According to Rory Lynch, partner and head of reputation management at Gateley Legal, it's a “fairly common tactic” in Hollywood and business disputes “for PR people on both sides to plant negative stories, sometimes false stories, about the opposition.”

“Even in the golden age of Hollywood, there were rumors that Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor used PR professionals to negatively brief each other.”

However, PR people who worked for Baldoni and his studio “dropped the ball a bit” by discussing tactics in texts, he told BBC News.

“It doesn't surprise me, especially in the US and Hollywood, that you have pretty aggressive crisis PR people.

“But the fact that they put it in writing, I think maybe it wasn't the wisest thing to do. Normally they could do something like that over the phone.''

Lively herself is an “accomplished operator” who “will have her own PR people working in the background as well,” Lynch added.

New York Timeswho broke the story of Lively's complaint over the weekend, said she “denies that she or any of her representatives planted or spread negative information about Mr. Baldoni or Wayfarer.”

The paper also stated that it is “impossible to know how much of the negative publicity” towards Lively was initially planted by those working on Baldoni's behalf, “and how much was noticed and amplified”.

Many fans who turned against Lively now see the situation in a different light.

“We are so capable of being manipulated into hating a woman that all we need is a coordinated PR effort to switch sides against a victim of domestic violence or a long-loved American sweetheart.” writes Maddie Mussen in the Standard.

“Now that our eyes are open, will we be harder to deceive? Or will we still want some excuse to turn against a famous woman who suddenly, in our eyes and in the eyes of those who manipulate us, no longer deserves it?”

The Guardian's Laura Snapes writes that she and her friends now “look back in horror at what we have said about her in recent months”.

She added: “Lively's complaint made my head spin. What can you really trust?'